A Michigan state Senator is trying to gather support for a bill to open some children’s protective services case data to lawmakers and members of the press.
Right now, information related to CPS cases is largely confidential. Under the current law, it’s usually only releasable to a specific list that includes the police, doctors treating a child who may be abused, and courts.
Senator Jim Runestad (R-White Lake) said giving sitting lawmakers and credentialed news media access to some limited information would help them discover and address issues within children’s protective services.
“You could start aggregating the data because you can’t release personal information, but you could start looking at case after case and the media could start going, ‘Wait a minute, we’re seeing a pattern here that you can’t see now.’ You can see nothing now. So it would make a huge difference in cleaning up the system, in reforming the system to run like it should,” Runestad told reporters during a press conference Wednesday.
The push for the bills comes after the 2023 murder of 5-year-old Ethan Belcher by his stepfather and mother. CPS had previous investigated the home in 2021, and Belcher's family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit.
Ethan’s aunt, Ashley Belcher, told reporters she was still dealing with the mental impact of his death. She said passing the bills can prevent similar cases in the future.
“We could save more babies if you do this, we can take a stand and make change,” Belcher said.
This is the second-straight session Runestad has introduced similar legislation. The bills have languished in committee both times.
Runestad said he’s disappointed with the lack of action.
“The whole system has tightened up. There’s no transparency, there’s secrecy, and everybody wants to hide in the tall grass instead of doing something about the problem,” he said.
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday afternoon about the legislation.
This session, the bill has been referred to the Senate Civil Rights, Judiciary, and Public Safety Committee. Senator Stephanie Chang (D-Detroit), who chairs the committee, said the bill has an important goal. But she has her concerns about it.
“I think that the idea of allowing lawmakers to have really, really sensitive information about children is really kind of problematic,” Chang said. “It's also my understanding that there are federal laws regarding child abuse and the keeping of these records that do prohibit the sharing of this information beyond a certain very limited number of people or types of people.”
Chang said she would be willing to work with interested fellow lawmakers on other efforts to keep kids safe. She highlighted bipartisan legislation aimed at preventing child abuse that the Senate has passed.
Among them was a bill package to help continue funding the state’s Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Board. The board assists in many of the state’s child abuse prevention efforts.
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